Sunset

 

It takes so long for the summer sun to go down. At 6:30 it was still a hundred degrees and the sun was turning orange. I looked out the kitchen window as I placed an empty bowl in the sink, still carrying just a trace of the beans and cornbread it had held. Just outside the gate of the X Garden a pair of Bobwhites engaged a ritual that sent me off to get the binoculars for a closer look. One (she?) buried herself deep into a damp spot of grass and earth where until yesterday the water hose had been leaking. The other (he?) stood with his head high beside her, radar on full, watching for any threats while she disappeared into the ground. I'm not sure what that was about. In a while they both went into the garden and wandered among the melon plants and bermuda grass catching bugs.

They are a cute couple. I see them pretty regularly now.  I thought I might catch a photo of them, so I grabbed the camera and walked quietly toward the garden. It was not to be. They flew off in a flutter that only a quail can make, one that will scare you if it happens at your feet in a field. They lighted in the tall uncut grass between the house and the mesquite woods. I found only a small feather they'd left behind, stuck to the bermuda grass, jumping in the wind.

But a hundred degrees or not, I was outdoors now, and continued the sunset walk. Walking on the property at this time of day is one of my favorite rituals. Sometimes we walk out on the berm so that a good view of the western edge of the field, lined with mesquite and oaks, allows us to watch the sun disappear slowly, orange light lingering for a long, long time.

This afternoon, however, I walked along the eastern edge of the field, next to our neighbor's property. The twelve acres adjacent to our place belonged to my grandmother as well. But she gave it away to a neighbor who'd cared for her in her last years. That property recently sold to a Church of Christ minister in town. He's in his 70's and is building a house on the place. I walked to where the house is laid out in wooden stakes and string on level ground, waiting to spring up. I walked about the clearings he'd created with his little red tractor. I found he'd cut a roadway through the thick mesquite woods all the way to the edge of what was once a pond. The pond is on the end of the property nearest our house. It looks like he's taking good care of these woods. I'm glad.

I retraced my steps and walked into the shadows swallowing the front yard I'd mowed this morning.

Birds were getting their final meals at the feeders and taking their evening baths. Despite the drought, the birds have been thick here this summer. Just today there was the usual gathering of cardinals, but also a big roadrunner, the quail, a woodpecker, and hummingbirds. The waxing gibbous moon is up over the pecan tree. In two more days it will be full, rising in the east, big and orange.

Company arrives tomorrow -- Taylor, Amber, Ava, and Jonas. On Friday Alan and his kids will come, as will Melinda and Jenna. This quiet, reluctant, hot, Texas sunset is my company tonight.